Great cheap slide guitar?

ok, so Im wanting to expand more into the world of slide guitar, but all of my current guitars have 10s and low action. Im wanting a good inexpensive but high quality guitar to slap some 12s on and have for open tunings and high action for slide.

How much can you spend? I'd go get one of those Ibanez Artists from the late 70s-early 80s with the super 58s. At the risk of getting flamed, I think those things are Les Paul killers. They can be had for $550-700. Not sure if that's the budget range.

you don't really need high action for slide. I used to think that too but I got tired of switching guitars at gigs and learned to play slide in standard tuning on my main strat. It's all about the finesse you use.
Having said that...nothing really sounds like a nice open D tuned slide solo

Look for one of those old Supro lap steels on CL. The type with the huge string through pup. You'll be amazed at how cool it is, and sounds waay bigger than a typical guitar. I see 'em for $400.00 a lot around Norcal.

anything that looks cool but plays terrible is a prime candidate for slide guitar! especially if it has low, worn-out frets

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Walter's right, as usual

But when I finally broke down and had my electric 'slide' guitar's neck straightened & refretted, I discovered that I could use the technique to any of my guitars if the slide's big enough

I'm currently using a Diamond Bottleneck in lead crystal, but Dunlop makes something similar in brass/chromed steel; A thick, heavy slide has enough mass to allow me to glide over the strings without applying any downward pressure

Took awhile to adjust my technique, tho'. At first, I wasn't able to generate enough volume on my acoustics with such a light touch. Eventually, I actually LOWERED the action on my National steel (and the string gauge, too!)

Well, I wouldn't say they're cheap now, but original Harmony H42 and H44 Stratotones make wonderful slide guitars. Eastwood is making copies of them now, and while they look similar, the construction, wood and pickups are different. I'd love to have an original but the prices are prohibitive now.

An early Harmony:

The new Airline H44

I'd also add that yeah, you can and should learn to play slide in standard tuning on a regular guitar, and I do it sometimes. The downside I've noticed is while learning to get your slide touch right, one ends up being a little heavy with the slide and bumping the frets a lot. This can lead to small divots in the frets and makes the guitar hard to play normally. I had this problem with a LP. I have various slides made from glass, ceramic, chromed steel and brass, in various sizes and thicknesses. While I love my heavy brass one for acoustic where the action is higher and the strings heavier, I use a light weight, thin walled brass one for my "regular" guitars. I have also found that using a bit more volume and gain helps with slide guitar as well.

My slide rig is based on a plywood Epi Special II. Cheap enough for you? I had a tall nut installed, set the bridge high, and use flatwound 12s on it. Along with a compressor, that's what works for me. I've changed its pickups and pots purely out of the urge to mod and tinker, although the stock pickups did sound good with distortion. The only thing on them that absolutely needs changing are the machine heads.

Why limit yourself with high action, terrible playing guitars. A big part of playing slide is what you do with your fingers when you're not using the slide. and that usual means chording and fretting strings.

I've been using my Samick SAT 650 for slide. Just as with the ES-335 types this budget guitar resembles, it makes an excellent slide guitar. For even cheaper, I'll next try setting up the Yamaha AEX502 for slide. Which for me means slightly raising action on the treble side. That's all it takes. Everything is strung with .11s anyway. The Yamaha is semihollow, thinline, with two P-90s. This should be fun.
MD